The Grammys

Someone told me the Grammy Awards were handed out last night. I stopped watching these quite some time ago. I do still like to watch the Oscar awards only because Actors are some of the looniest people on earth and more often than not they give good speeches.

Can anyone explain awards shows to me? Specifically, why awards are given out for things that are subjective? For example, here are the five nominees for “Best Word of All Time”:

Haberdasher
Conifer
Hovercraft
Borscht
Rastafarian

Now, I’m sure you could tell me which of these five words is your favorite, right? We all have favorite things in life. My favorite here is Haberdasher for obvious reasons. But is Haberdasher the best word? Does it have some quality the other five words lack? Of course not. The same goes for music or artwork or movies or anything else that is entirely subjective. Everyone can pick a favorite, and the overwhelming majority of people may have the same favorite thing, but that does not make it the best, or make it deserving of any type of award. I always enjoy the many articles analyzing the Oscar awards before they happen. They always divide up the nominees into “Should Win” and “Will Win” categories. Their reasoning is insane at best bordering on demented.

“E.T. The Extra Terrestrial SHOULD WIN the best picture award due to its sentimentality and amazing special effects. Gandhi WILL WIN the award because of its social commentary and brilliant acting on the part of Ben Kingsley.”

Yes, a human being was paid to write the sentence above. Better yet, an editor read this statement and thought it was a brilliant commentary; a sentence comparing a movie about an alien puppet to a movie about a great world leader from India. As if special effects somehow relate to a commentary on the life of India’s greatest man. Somehow it is acceptable to compare a film with a cute alien who eats Reese’s Pieces to a film with no visible aliens and come up with a valid commentary on which one deserves an award? It is one of the great American time wasting endeavors of all time. Don’t get me started on AFI’s 100 greatest movie list they put out every year. (Hint: Number one is almost always the Godfather, even though there are no other mafia movies in the list. No aliens in that movie either).

Anyway, I would like to hand out some of my own Grammys to counteract the silly awards given out last night. I think the problem is that the categories are too broad. Best song of the year? Do you know how many songs were written and recorded last year? I would guess one hundred billion (plus or minus 5). How do you compare a classical song to a pop song to a country song to a rock song to a Zimbabwean who raps while tap dancing and beating a tin drum with his penis? If you can do it, you are a better person than I (the comparison thing, not the penis thing).

The categories need to be narrower to give them more meaning. Like:

“Cutest Irish Voice coming out of a 50 year old head”
“Best transvestite trying to look shocking when actually looking like a mentally challenged 12 year old who got locked in her mother’s closet overnight”
“Least whiny country song not about beer or divorce or death”
“Best use of tin whistle”
“Best duet by over 40 year old males who still have most of their hair and do not currently take drugs”

See you at next year’s ceremony…